The Valcano Weapon
by Professor Augustine
Summary: In 2008 the state of Illinois is experiencing violant earthquakes, The Eighth Doctor arrives and joins a young college student named Tommy Wallace and his Amish girlfriend in an atemmpt to stop a Titan mother ship from destroying the world!


Doctor Who

The Volcano Weapon,

By Zachary Shaw.

The long empty highway, the road that to Tommy Wallace seemed to go on forever, but he knew at some point that the road turned into Edwardsville, and he knew that was where the commotion was coming from. The sound was loud, and deafening, loud enough to make Tommy cover his ears and watch with terror. He feared what might come down the highway, because you never knew this late at night. He lived out in the middle of nowhere, near an Amish community named Summerfield. Tommy knew the noise had nothing to do with them, and he knew that if they were hearing the same thing he was than he was in real trouble. Tommy was young, twenty years old, and this was one of his first time's away from home. He figured that something like this would happen as soon as he left his mom's house. Tom was always looking at things with his glass half full, and when he heard the last loud shake and tumble he knew something bad was happening.

In the loud roar, in the crumbling sound was screaming, loud screaming that made Tom run back inside his little house. It was a nice house; it had two floors, a bathroom, two bedrooms, a kitchen, two rooms just for his wardrobes, and of course, sitting rooms and libraries. He was able to afford this house because he got a full scholarship and was paying for this house from the money that he had saved up over many years. He looked north, the direction that the Amish community was, the place where he worked and was paid quite good. He was tired, so he decided to go inside and see what the TV was saying. If there were anything big they would have something about it on the news, and as he walked into his house the first thing he heard was his emergency broadband radio blaring loudly to life. "Attention, this is an emergency broadcast to all those living in the vicinity of Edwardsville, a freak earthquake has claimed the lives of many of the citizens living in the downtown area."

Tom looked at the radio in shock, Edwardsville had never experienced a earthquake, and if the loud sound he was hearing was the quake, than it was still going on! That couldn't be though, Tom knew that Earthquakes only lasted a few minutes at most, and this one was still growing, but he felt things all around him shaking, and then the house was rocked off its foundation! He held onto the walls as the thing began to fall apart all around him, and he decided to leave everything in the house and run! Everything inside him told him to run, and as he dogged falling beams and braking glass he looked outside in horror as the ground was actually cracking open! "Oh God, what's happening?" He asked, and was trapped between the door and the rest of the house. He saw the crack in the ground expanding toward his house and knew he had to do something.

The radio was still operating as it shouted out warnings, "All citizens around the Edwardsville community are warned that aftershocks of this quack are expanding, and getting stronger!" Then a huge beam fell onto the radio, and the table that it was placed on, both shattered in a brilliant crash.

"Aftershocks, what is going on?" He wandered aloud, because Illinois was nowhere near a fault line. He watched the clocks all around him falling off, and saw the floor cracking as well. He took a chance, and took a flying leap toward the outside as the house crumbled all around him. The last thing he remembered was leaping from the house as the thing fell into the crack in the earth. He almost fell into the crack, and just before he grabbed a strong rock and was hanging by the rock, holding on for dear life. Then as he tried to climb to the surface, he happened to look down, and once he did, he saw lights. At first he thought it was magma, but then he realized that they were smaller lights. Once Tommy and his mother had traveled to Florida by flying an airplane, and those lights looked the way the cities looked from the airplane. He tried to pull himself to the surface, as he did he almost slipped, and then steadied himself again.

A voice spoke to him, it was like an echo at first but then growing increasingly louder, "Tommy Webber, this is The Darkman, you here me don't you? You can feel my evil, let go and jump down to hell and be with me forever!"

Tommy was barley able to whisper in terror, "Who are you?"

"I am The Darkman."

Tommy was so scared that he pulled himself up onto the Earth, and panted with grate pride that he managed to escape that fate. He looked up, and saw that his house was ripped apart and reduced to ashes. "Son of a bitch!"

In the distance, Tommy saw a man walking, he was not so much walking, as he was floating! He wore a dark business suit, the kind that you would expect a lawyer to wear, and he was smiling. "You brought me back to Earth Tommy Webber, you brought me here and my mother will give birth to me, thank you Tommy Webber, for giving me life on Earth once more I will let you live!" He began walking closer to Tommy, holding his arms out and smiling at him, "Give us a hug!"

"No," then Tommy ran, he tripped over newly upturned earth and gravel, leaving the wreckage of his house, his car, and everything he loved to keep away from the Darkman. Was that his name? Tommy wandered, The Darkman?

The clouds above were storm clouds, and they were flashing blue with ghostly lightning, and it looked like the end of the world as Tommy ran. He could fell his heart pounding heavily and making him sic, but he knew he had to keep running. The rain began pouring down on him and he could feel the Darkman behind him. "What do you want?"

He didn't say anything, he just kept on walking toward Tommy saying "The Doctor is on the way, don't you worry Tommy, we'll meet again."

Tommy began running very fast, and before he knew it he was laying on the ground, he had tripped and was getting ready to pass out. He looked around ferociously to see if he could find the man who was chasing him, and much to his relief he could not. To that end, as he lay on the ground confident that he had escaped disaster he passed out.

In her room she heard the loud noise going on, Alice Summerfield wandered what was going on outside, she was in the city, why was she in the city? Alice belonged back in her nice little Amish community but instead she was in a prison. The room she was staying at was barley big enough for the bed she was strapped to, and all the machines that she was hooked up to. Alice looked at the strange tubes that went from her arms and into the strange bags of fluid hanging by the things that looked like metal coat hangers. "Help me! I beg of you to let me out!" Alice called to her captors, but as usual, their was no answer. Alice looked up at the window and saw an ominous red glow, and wandered if that signaled the end of the world. If that were the case she would welcome it, because she had been trapped here for so long that if everything was going to end and the rapture was on the way than her soul would be released and go to heaven. She held onto that thought they way that Tommy Wallace had held onto the rocks when he was about to fall off the ledge. She wrapped the thought of her going to heaven all around her like a shield against whatever villainy that these horrible people might try to do to her. In this time Alice tried to remember why she had been out of her home in the first place, why, she thought back and could vaguely recall being with someone, but who was it? She knew that it was a man, she remembered staying with him at his parent's house because her family was in town shopping and she had, snuck off to be with this man. No, he was much too young to be a man, he was a teenager like her, and they had been in love. Alice smiled as she thought back to how nice the man had been to her, he had taught her all about the literature that her parents would not let her read, and he had walked with her when his family would come down to visit Summerfield. Her family was the oldest family in that community, thus it was named after them, and every year they would host a picnic that would have people from all over come and visit with them. That was how she had met this young man, but she just couldn't remember his name, what was it, and why couldn't she remember? Alice decided to think about the young man, he was a college student, and every time they talked he seemed thrilled just to be talking to her. She thought that must be what caused her to act so impulsively as sneaking of with him whenever her family was in town. The loud sounds outside increased, the screams seemed more horrid, and the smell of fire and smoke filled the room. "What's going on?" Alice demanded, and of course nothing happened.

On the other side of the door was the large and sophisticated lab, everything inside it was bleeping and buzzing. There were test tubes that were filled in much the same way that the strange bags on the metal coat racks in Alice's room were filled. Scientists were walking around, they were wearing white lab coats and most were carrying reports to Mister Taylon. He was the head of this amazing project and as Donald Dayton walked through he wandered if they should even be trying this. He saw a small TV that was showing the wreckage and what was left of Edwardsville. The town looked the way that New Orleans did after Hurricane Katrina had ravaged the place. "This story continues to unfold in all it's gruesome detail, and as more and more reports of aftershocks filter into the station we are feeling the widespread effects of the quake."

A woman in a white lab coat walked over to Don and whispered, "Has Mister Dallas stopped the machine yet?"

"No, in fact he instructed everyone working on the Eden project to turn it up, I don't know what we should do, and some of the other scientists like me are starting to wander if Eden is responsible for the earthquakes." Brandy Lorry was good friends with Don, but she was so ordinary that she blended in with the background and knew that Don would recognize her until she was right in front of him. She liked Don, in fact he was probably her only real friend on Project Eden and so had no trouble in confiding everything to him.

Don looked down the lab, everyone was crowded around the TV's at the other end watching the damage of the last few quakes. One person said "I wander how extensive the damage will be?"

Another answered "If we keep powering up Eden it might be worldwide."

Yet a third person said "Mister Dallas has to know that the United States government will not allow this to go on anymore."

Inside the Administrators office, a small place with a TV, a desk, and dozens of papers on top of the desk, sat Mister Taylon Dallas. He laughed wildly as he watched the destruction on the screen as the camera passed over the ruins of Edwardsville. "Wonderful, this is wonderful!" Mister Dallas looked at the ruins that stretched out across the entire state of Illinois, "Everything is working perfectly." Dallas looked at the small concealed panel at the end of the room, and then decided to look at his pet. "Computer, open panel and activate voice control screen." The silver panel pulled back into the rest of the wall revealing an alien control screen, and on the screen was alien writing. A few of the alien letters began to glow and the screen flashed to show Alice Summerfield in the operating room. Mister Dallas smiled as he watched the screen, "I wander how much more DNA we will have to extract before we find the Mitochondria control codon?" Mister Dallas asked himself, and saw a scientist at the door, he held up his hand and told her to wait for a moment. "Computer conceal screen."

When Mister Dallas waved in the scientist the door opened and he sat down, "Mister Dallas, you remember me don't you?"

Mister Dallas looked at the woman and his memory was jogged "Oh, right, Brandy Lorry from the Alice Summerfield operation, right?"

"Yes, about that, Sir I was wandering, why do we have to be hurting that poor woman like that?" Brandy couldn't stand to be in the room with Alice, and she knew that the woman was in pain because Brandy could here the girl crying when she walked by.

Mister Dallas sighed a sympathetic sigh, "Well, I understand, I mean it, every time she begs to be let out I, feel her pain, but we cant let her go just yet."

"Why Sir? She wont talk about what's happened to her, and I'm sure her family wants her back as much as she wants to go back." Brandy could still here the girl crying for her parents the same way that a little child would cry. "Sir if we keep this up than we might kill her, accidental her death may be but we have to stop taking her DNA." Brandy knew she had stepped over the line, and wished she could take that last bit back, but she knew she could not.

Mister Dallas was trying to hold back the rage, but he was not doing a very good job. As he stood up he made his hand into a fist and smashed the glass of coffee he was drinking. "Do you know what the purpose of this project is Miss Lorry?"

Brandy closed her eyes not wanting to look at the anger in her boss, "Yes Sir, please don't get angry." She could here her voice trembling with fear as she looked at the man who was walking toward her and backing her up against the walls. Now Brandy was as scared as she had ever been in her life. She began to run through her mind and remember all the people who were rumored to go missing in this office, and the thing that worried her most was that no one seemed to be curious about all the missing people.

"GET ANGRY? WHY THE HELL WOULD I GET ANGRY?" Mister Dallas had to cool his temper, he saw people outside turning their heads and looking at the door. He lowered his voice and began to speak softly, "What I'm trying to say is that this project is very important to the survival of humanity, and that if we let her go before we use her to her potential than we risk ruining the project. Do you understand?" Mister Dallas placed his hand on Brandy's blonde curly hair, and whispered in her ear, "Do you understand?"

Brandy was scared of the handsome man in the nice black suit, and so she was shaking a lot as Mister Dallas got closer to her. "Yes, yes Sir, I'm sorry about talking back to you I know how you don't like that."

Mister Dallas smiled and kissed her, "I would like to make it up to you Brandy, would that be al right?"

"Yes Sir, of course, and then I can apologize for thinking about leaving the project."

Mister Dallas smiled and said "Well now, you know that there are only two ways leaving the project, number one with a Nobel Prize, or in a body bag." Mister Dallas then started to laugh at the comment he just made. The two began walking out of the office, and through the crowd of scientists who were watching the TV and shaking their heads.

Tommy Wallace heard the loud whooshing sound that sounded like the distant hum of trucks on the highway at night. He looked around and saw that it was day outside, and that he barely missed being sucked into the new fault line that formed right beside him. Tommy stood up, and saw that the once beautiful countryside where he lived had been transformed into a disaster area. The few houses that were around him were smashed the way his home was, and his cell phone was dead when he checked. The strange loud whooshing sound was beginning again, and louder than it had been before. Slowly a blue flashing light began to appear before his very eyes. Slowly something began to take shape as the whooshing sound became louder and louder. A box began to appear, it was like those old phone booths that you would see Clark Kent rush into to change into Superman in the older TV series. The thing that made this odd box that was materializing in front of him was that it was blue and had a strange light glowing atop of it. Tommy didn't quite know what to think of it, and so he just stood there watching the strange dust whip up around the formation of a big blue telephone box. As the thing became more and more clear Tommy was wandering if he should even stay here at all, whilst part of him wanted to stay and watch what the thing would materialize into most of him wanted to run. Suddenly he saw the heavy box appear and it was solid! The thing had two windows that were tinted so you could not look in, something that looked like a panel just below the windows, and at the very top it had the words "Police public call box."

A loud sound was heard from inside the box, and as they opened Tommy didn't know what would emerge from them. He stood, and was not able to move his legs he was so frightened by this thing. A man walked out; he was rather ordinary looking and that surprised Tommy because he expected to see some bug eyed monster walk out. He was tall, had a lot of blonde hair around his head in what almost, but not quite, resembled an afro. Under the heavy flap of hair the man's eyes were strange and ancient, and his face was one that would blend in perfectly with a crowd. He was tall, and rather lanky looking if you were to ask Tommy, and he walked toward Tommy and in a heavy British accent he said the words "Hello, am, yeah, your probably pretty shocked right now aren't you?"

Tommy nodded his head in agreement but couldn't say anything because he was so shocked that this man appeared in a blue box and just strolled out like it was nothing. After all, if you saw this wouldn't you be shocked just a little?

"Well, you are a very profound speaker aren't you? Can you tell me where and when I am? I lost my chronometer in the later 25th century. Oh, where are my manners, "I'm The Doctor by the way, what's your name?" The Doctor stared at Tommy Wallace who hadn't moved at all since he arrived, and so The Doctor waved a hand in front of the young man's face. "Hello, man who just stepped out of strange blue box calling, well, stranger." The Doctor sighed, "Well I guess I will have to use my psychic field inhibiter to wake you from your shock."

The Doctor held up a strange little device that was about the size of a pen, and looked like a screwdriver only that the tip of it seemed to glow ever so slightly. "Now my boy when I place this screwdriver back in my pocket you will wake up from your shock." The Doctor waited, clapped his hands and waited for the scream that would come in a second.

Tommy screamed so loud that all the birds in the trees that were left standing and the ones that were in the trees on the ground, flew off in every direction. "What kind of a thing is that?" He asked pointing a trembling finger at the blue box.

"Right, that thing is my TARDIS, now could you please tell me where and when I am, and what happened to this place? It looks like an Earthquake ripped through the place." The Doctor looked around and decided that his statement had been correct, everything had been ripped apart by earthquake's and he couldn't figure out why. "I have to be somewhere around California in the late 23rd century, right?" The Doctor watched as the young man calmed himself down.

"No Doctor, your in southern Illinois, in the 21st century, and my name's Tommy Webber. Tell me, what is a TARDIS?" Tommy was just now getting his voice back from the shock he had been through.

"Well Tommy Wallace nice to have you back talking again, well a TARDIS stands for Time And Relative Dimension In Space, and I was wandering something else my boy, what exactly did happen to this place? Southern Illinois is setting on a fault line but that shouldn't become active for another thousand years." The Doctor knew his question would take time to seep in, and so he slowed himself down to accommodate that.

"Last night we had an earthquake, it ripped through Edwardsville and nearly destroyed the surrounding communities." Tommy looked past The Doctor and wandered how this TARDIS was able to materialize from nowhere. "Is that a time machine, or a space ship?" Tommy waited to here the answer that he knew was coming.

"Yes, both, my TARDIS can go anywhere and everywhere. Now why have there been so many earthquakes?" The Doctor was finding there was something odd about this young man because most humans would run away when they saw something like this. The Doctor looked all about him again, "Now tell me, do you know why the earthquakes occurred here? Last time I checked Illinois had a dormant fault line that was supposed to stay dormant for thousands of years."

Tommy looked at the strange man and said "Well, I heard a geologist on TV talking about how the area was supposed to be expecting earthquakes due to reactivity in the fault line." Tommy looked all around at the many ground heaps that had been shoved up and made rudimentary mounts of dirt.

"That would explain the reason this place looks like a disaster area, but why? Do they know have they said anything else?" The Doctor asked and looked at Tommy with urgent egger eyes that said he was impatient.

"Well, before I blacked out I remember my radio talking about the head of a project that was supposed to study these quakes." Tommy tried his best to remember the words that the radio had said before it was smashed. "Project Eden, those were the only words I can remember before I fell down on the ground." Tommy then had an image of The Darkman walking toward him, no chasing him down. Tommy could still hear the voice in his mind, that strange evil sound, and he shivered whenever he thought of it.

"Is something the matter Tommy?" The Doctor asked, and he asked this because he was The Doctor and he could usually tell when someone was holding something back from him. So he looked into the young man's eyes, and saw not deception, but fear.

"Yes, you see Doctor, I was going to see a girl, before I blacked out. I don't have any family around here and when the quake hit I was really worried about her and I wanted to see if her family would take me I while I waited to call my parents." Tommy looked at The Doctor, why did he trust this man all of a sudden? It was like The Doctor was one of those guys who made you want to trust him, and maybe that was the reason.

The Doctor sighed "Well the TARDIS is big enough for me to take you to, wherever you wanted to go, but I'm going to find out more about project Eden, I don't remember reading about it in any history books." The Doctor walked toward the blue box and turned his head over his shoulder and saw that Tommy Wallace was not yet following him. "We'll go and check on this girl of yours Tommy my boy."

"Alright Doctor, she lives in Summerfield." Tommy couldn't believe that he was following this man, but he was, and he told himself that he was doing this so he could find Alice. He loved Alice and he would do anything for her, and now he could safely assume that is why he was doing this.

The Doctor walked into the blue box and Tommy heard his footsteps that seemed to echo inside the box. "Doctor how are we going to get to Summerfield in the box?"

"Come along inside my boy and see for yourself." The Doctor said as he walked around the interior of the TARDIS. He began pulling the levers up that would start the engines and he stabilized the gravity that would be needed for human life. He was looking at the controls that were showing the names of all the surrounding communities that existed in the 21st century. The name Summerfield appeared on the screen, and to The Doctor's relief he saw that it was only a few miles away. He wouldn't have to use a lot of the TARDIS energy, and then he heard Tommy's footsteps inside the ship.

"This is amazing, wow, like you weren't yanking me around were you dude this is really a space ship! Why is it bigger on the inside than it is on the outside?" Tommy had so many questions that he was ashamed to admit that Alice was the last thins on his mind.

"The TARDIS can be bigger on the inside because of an chameleon circuit that makes it blend in to whatever surrounding it lands at." The Doctor looked at the boy's face and smiled when he saw that the boy was thinking about this.

"Then why does it look like a big blue box?" Tommy asked, and then his eyes moved to the large computer console in the center of the room. It was huge, and it rose for the entire place. His eyes went to the small green cylinder that was rising and falling in the middle of the large silver column.

"Well the TARDIS landed in the center of London and it was 1953 when they had police box's, and the chameleon circuit got stuck as one." The Doctor smiled, and began working the buttons of the control panels. "Now then, let's go see this Alice Summerfield of yours, by the way I pulled up the community on the TARDIS computer and now all I have to do is set the ship in motion." The Doctor was always proud when he met a human who wasn't afraid of him or his lifestyle. For a few minutes the entire room began shaking and rocking as the ship traveled through space to arrive at its destination. The Doctor decided to start a new conversation. "How did you meet an Amish girl Tommy? You don't exactly look like their type."

Tommy was so amazed by actually being inside an alien ship that he was shocked to here such a human question. "Well I'm not Amish, and to answer your question Doctor her family owns all of the Summerfield community. So every year they would have this big picnic and invite everyone from all around to come by. My family loved hanging out with the Amish, so we would see each other every year. Then once we got to realize how close I lived to her I would write letters and send them to her, then she would respond to me, and so on and so on." Tommy paused as he listened to the strange sound that the TARDIS was making as it moved. He could fell the strange machine and right now he wanted to have a familiar face to look at. He wanted to have Alice nearby so she could tell him, in her oh so simple way, that everything was going to be all right.

The Doctor said "Does her family know that you two have been keeping in touch?"

"No, in fact it has gotten to the point where whenever she and her family would come to town shopping I would arrange to met her there so we could spend time together. One day last year I went up to her home and her family got me a job on her farm, and that is the excuse I had been using to get to spend time with her lately." Tommy sighed, she seemed so far away, and he was so worried that something had happened to her. "Does this ship have medical facilities in case Alice is hurt?"

"Yes, I have nanogenes." Was The Doctor's answer as he strolled around the computer console saying "And my friend we are at Summerfield."

When he woke up that morning Mister Samuel Summerfield could never have imagined what the damage from the earthquake would have been. His barn was in ruins and he had lost two of his best horses when the thing went to pieces. He walked through the ruined field that had been upturned and al the dirt thrown everywhere. Trees had fallen and when he walked outside in the sunlight he was able to see that the roof of his house had been damaged a little. Right now he watched through the windows as his daughter Sarah rushed through the kitchen throwing fallen planks from the roof out of the door. Her mother was trying to clean all the fallen glass out of the living room and was having a very hard time with it. A falling tree that smashed through the room and ruined almost everything in it had shattered the two large windows. It was at times live these that Abigail Summerfield had wished that her daughter Alice was still with them, but she wasn't. At the beginning of the year he had come to take her away, and it was because of their sacrifice that their community was still able to live. It was while Abigail was working in the living room that she heard the strange sound from outside, the sound that was similar to a whooshing that the wind makes on a windy night. "Samuel, are you out there? Are you okay?"

In fact Samuel Summerfield was walking half way across his field when he heard the sound on the other side of the highway that ran along side the field. At first Samuel thought it was a truck zooming by and decided that it was nothing. He walked toward the end of his field to see what the strange noise was. He saw the thing beginning to take shape at the other end of the highway. He began walking toward the sound, he didn't know what it was or what he was going to do when he reached it because he had no weapons, but he ran toward it nevertheless. He wanted to find out what it was so he would know if it was dangerous enough to threaten his family. Whenever Mister Summerfield thought of his family nowadays he had to think of his wife Abigail and his youngest daughter Sarah, and not Alice. Samuel tried not to think about Mister Dallas and the day that he took Alice away to live a better life, but he did nevertheless. That sound that was coming from the other side of the highway made him think of Alice even though he knew it was no use to think of Alice because she would never return. So he ran toward the strange sound to protect his own family, the little family he had left.

The TARDIS had fully materialized along the side of a large highway that ran across the community known as Summerfield. The side door of the TARDIS opened and The Doctor strolled confidently out of the ship. "Well Tommy my boy, this is very odd."

"Why is that odd Doctor, everything is nice and sunny." Tommy followed The Doctor out of the strange ship and into the lovely sunshine morning.

"Well, I directed the TARDIS to land just beside the Summerfield home, and I wander why it landed so far away." The Doctor pointed toward the large home at the far end of the ruined field. "You see, Tommy, I wouldn't go wandering about." The Doctor reached into his pocket and pulled out his Sonic Screwdriver. He operated the small series of buttons that lined the edge of the thing and created a small holographic image at the top of the machine.

"What's that Doctor?" Tommy demanded as he looked at the strange device that The Doctor seemed to be operating. Tommy looked toward the house where he knew Alice would be, where she had to be staying.

"It's my Sonic Screwdriver, it can do just about everything." The Doctor looked at the strange readings. "Apparently there was some kind of field that is keeping the TARDIS from getting any closer to the house." The Doctor began watching the house, and looking at the image. He looked again and saw the Sonic Screwdriver image fading out of existence.

Tommy shook his head, "Well Doctor, I don't see anything wrong with this place, just hang on right there, and I'll go and see Alice." Tommy began walking away from the strange blue box and he saw Alice's father standing in the field. Tommy waved at him, "Hey Sam, it's me Tommy Wallace, remember?" He shouted as he waved his arms back and forth in the air. He hadn't seen Samuel in a few months because of his schoolwork, and now he wandered if Sam recognized who he was. The nice cool wind blew past his head and he smiled as he felt the wind, and it made him think once again of Alice. He knew that he was running to meet Alice; he knew that she was in the house and everything would be okay. He could forget all about The Doctor and he would do whatever it takes to be with Alice, and stay with her.

Mister Samuel Summerfield smiled when he realized it was Tommy, "Thomas, dear me it seems like it's been years." Sam shook the hand of his old friend, he knew it had only been a few months and Sam was wandering what brought the young worker back.

"How are you Sam?" Tommy asked as he looked behind him at The Doctor walking toward him.

"Fine my friend, just fine, what brings you to my home with your, friend back there?" Samuel pointed to The Doctor who was walking closer and closer to them.

"Oh, that's just The Doctor, I my house was destroyed last night during the earthquake and I was wandering how your family was." Tommy was trying to keep from Sam the fact that he couldn't stand not knowing how Alice was, and so his story sounded rather like a lie, even to him.

"Well, we were all okay, survived the quake without injury, but my house was damaged, and my barn was completely destroyed." Sam knew that Tommy was here to see Alice, and so he wandered what he should tell him when he asked. Every day Alice was gone Samuel grew to hate himself more and more, he wanted his daughter back and would do almost anything to get her. He looked at the strange man who Tommy called The Doctor walking toward him.

Tommy had worked with this man for a few months, and so he could tell whenever something was wrong, or rather, when he was hiding something. The Doctor however had never worked with Samuel Summerfield nor had he ever met the man for that matter. He saw the worry in this man's eyes, The Doctor said "Hello there, my name is The Doctor, I'm with the CIA and I was wandering, has anything odd been going on around here lately?"

Sam had never heard a British accent before, so he was quite shocked when he heard it, "Well, are you really with the government?"

"Yes, they ran out of American volunteers so they enlisted us Brit's." The Doctor laughed at his own joke, and when he saw that only Tommy was laughing, so he stopped.

Sam looked at Tommy, "I trust you my boy, is he a friend?"

"Yah Sam of course, he's one of my best friend's, what's the matter?" Tommy saw that Sam wanted to talk about it, and Tommy feared that whatever it was involved Alice. So he perused the matter. "You know Sam The Doctor can help you if you need it."

The Doctor walked toward the two friends, "Has anything happened that made you feel uncomfortable Sam? Anyone that threatened your family in anyway?" The Doctor saw fear in the simple man's face, and wandered what put it there. "Samuel, if something is happening, if strange people have been around your home and community you tell me right away and I promise I can help."

Sam looked at these two men, Tommy was honest, and The Doctor seemed like he was telling the truth, so he confessed his worst sin. "He took my Alice away from me, he stole her and made me promise not to talk about her anymore." Sam looked all around and was obviously under a grate deal of stress.

"What do you mean Sam? Who took Alice?" Tommy demanded before The Doctor could say anything.

"He called himself Mister Dallas, he said he was with something called Project Eden, and he said he could do something with his computers that would keep our community perfect and pure forever." Sam looked at the road, and then at The Doctor. "He had his men come inside the community and he built strange metal rocks all over the place. Then he took my Alice, and said he would never bother us again."

The Doctor looked around, "Tell me quick, did he tell you what kind of things he would plant around this place?"

"No Doctor, he just said that he would place metal rocks all around the place and he said they would keep out the outside world." Sam wandered why The Doctor seemed so concerned about this little Amish community.

The Doctor's mind wandered off a little, and then said "Maybe that's why The TARDIS wouldn't land any closer to the house." The Doctor looked around the place and took out his silver Sonic Screwdriver.

Sam looked at the device that was as big as a pen; it was silver and had a series of buttons that ran down the side of the machine. "What are you doing with that Doctor?" Asked Sam as he looked at the strange device. Sam had only used a modern pen every once and a while but he had never seen anything like this one before.

"It's called a Sonic Screwdriver, he can use it as a kind of all purpose device." Tommy explained, "Is it showing anything odd Doctor?"

"Yes." The Doctor answered without looking at Tommy.

"What's it showing?" Tommy asked.

"Nothing, normally this machine would pick up anything with an electronic signal in an five mile radius, and it's not showing anything. That means that a force field must be operating around this area." The Doctor walked around the place trying to get any sort of signal on his Sonic Screwdriver. "You don't know where they placed these metal rocks do you Sam?" The Doctor asked as he looked at the edge of the machine.

Tommy sighed as he said "How long ago did they take Alice?"

"Four months ago, and every day I hate myself for giving my daughter up to strangers." Sam looked at the strange Doctor and he was ignoring everything but that strange machine. "Why should you care so much about what happens to my daughter?" Sam was intent on making the mans intention's clear.

Tommy decided he would not lie to this man any more, that no matter what happened Samuel Summerfield deserved to know that Tommy Wallace and his daughter were in love. "I love her, and she love's me. I want too find her as much as you do."

From a few feet away The Doctor looked at his Sonic Screwdriver, "I'm finally getting a reading, Tommy we can go now, and the force field is week at this time of day." The Doctor had never seen anything like this in his 900 years of time travel, and that bugged the hell out of him. When The Doctor turned around Tommy was trying to explain to his farmer why he loved his daughter, and frankly it annoyed The Doctor to think that life and death matters were hanging in the balance and Tommy Webber was explaining his roll of Romeo to Alice's Juliet. "Tommy, we have to get back to the TARDIS, then we can go off and find Alice." The Doctor began walking back toward the blue box sitting on the other side of the highway, and as he did he was already running through a long list in his mind of who could have done this.

"Wait up Doctor! I'm coming too!" Tommy shouted as he broke away from the dreadful conversation he was having with Mister Summerfield. Before he got too closer to The Doctor Tommy looked back at the older man and shouted "Don't worry Samuel, I'll bring your daughter back to you, I promise." Tommy began walking toward The Doctor who was smiling a wide smile.

"Just when you think you've sorted out that all human beings are bad one really good one comes along and set's you right again, fantastic!" The Doctor had seen humanity at it's worst, and now he was seeing humanity at it's best. This was human nature then: a love stricken young man who would do anything for the woman he loves. The Doctor said aloud "I'm a sucker for a good romance story."

"Can we just go and destroy the shields already?" Tommy asked, and then he began walking beside The Doctor toward the blue box at the other end of the field.

"Were not going to destroy the shields, were going to find out what the hell project Eden is about and if we do that we might figure out how we can destroy it." The Doctor had his mind set, he was all for the betterment of human kind, but this project, whatever it was, was taking girls away from their family and keeping them locked away from their loved ones. If the Doctor had his way he would find the building, transmat Alice out of the base, and then destroy it and whoever was in charge. He looked over at Tommy and asked, "Will you really send Alice back to her father if we find her?"

"It doesn't matter what I want, I'm in love Doctor, and I'll do anything for her." Tommy wandered why The Doctor was asking about this, and what's more why he was answering like this. The Tommy Wallace he knew never would have chosen to risk his life in destroying some building like this just for Alice Summerfield. In fact the only way he knew she loved him was through their letters and he was worried that she would reject him. It was like he didn't even think about that, maybe it was because it didn't matter if he was rejected, he loved Alice, and that was all that mattered. Then, like most good ideas that strike you when you think about something very little, and then the answer to the problem comes to you. "Hey Doctor I just got an idea, I remember my friend Brandy Lorry telling me about how she had just gotten work at project Eden. If you can power up my cell phone I can call her and she can direct us to where the project is being held."

The Doctor smiled, "Fantastic idea Tommy my boy." He began operating the computers that surrounded the center console on the control center of the amazing computer filled room. The Doctor held out his hand and said, "Give me the phone Tommy and I'll charge it."

From the doors of the TARDIS Tommy Wallace walked over and tossed the small cell phone to The Doctor. "How are you going to charge it in here?" Tommy asked as he looked around for a power outlet.

"With my Sonic Screwdriver."

The city of Edwardsville was still in ruins, and people were clambering to get out of the smashed place as fast as they could. Cars were hit as people tried to run away from the disaster area, and traffic pile ups were miles long. Many of the buildings that would once have been pretty skyscrapers were now reduced to rubble on the cement sidewalk. Emergency crews were working around the clock, so they would not notice if one more person went missing. Brandy Lorry thought about all this as Mister Dallas led her down the sidewalk. She was too worried about what he would do to her if she turned against him, and that thought was enough to make her do whatever he wanted. The two passed a area on the city that had been opened to the magma deep into the earth. It was the first time that Brandy had ever seen red liquid bubbling up and past the subway. She looked away, and brushed the thoughts of how many people were trapped in the subway away from her mind. She decided to ask Mister Dallas about the project, "How much longer will we have to keep that poor girl in our lab?"

Mister Dallas turned around and said, "Well my dear, whenever we get the correct DNA sequence from her blood stream and coding." He smiled a smile that would have made a politician green with envy. The smile was one that made Brandy trust him, and Mister Dallas knew that as well as he knew that the sky was blue.

Brandy looked all around her, "I cant help but think that maybe we are the cause of all this Mister Dallas, perhaps not on purpose, but nevertheless." She saw that he was holding back something behind his eyes, and so she tried to silence herself.

"Yes, if this is our fault we are doing it by accident, but as I said before if we are causing these earthquakes by using those beams than the government would shut us down." Mister Dallas knew that the secretary of defense stopped by yesterday, and vanished. He had shown the secretary all his real computers and told him the real reason that he was drilling into the center of the Earth. That was when Mister Dallas had killed the man, and made the final adjustments to the machine that was ripping the Earth apart. He knew that soon he would have to dispose of the nosy Brandy Lorry.

Brandy forced a smile and looked at her cell phone that showed she was getting a call, "One moment please Mister Dallas, my friend Tommy is calling me."

"Take the call." Mister Dallas said, and then, as she walked away, he began thinking about how many ways he could kill this nosy little woman. He reached into his pocket and pulled out a Sonic Lance. It was a device that looked like a laser pointer, a device that he stole off a murdered Time Lord who had come to Earth to stop him earlier. As he turned on the lance he wandered if the Time Lord high council would send another person to kill him, and then decided to focus on killing Brandy Lorry.

"Tommy, why do you want to know about the Eden project?"

"Come on Brandy, we haven't talked in forever, just tell me where your working." Tommy sounded rather urgent, and so Brandy wasn't paying attention to Mister Dallas, who was walking up behind her with the glowing Sonic Lance.

On board the TARDIS The Doctor was trying to pinpoint the location of the call, it was much harder than you would think. The Doctor had never tried this before, and the force field that had been erected was affecting the computers of the TARDIS. The Doctor had figured out that only the Time Lords would have the technological capacity to build a temporal force field. He leaned over the computers and they finally found the street that the call was coming from. "I've got it Tommy my boy, now, say a good bye and let's rescue the maiden in distress."

Brandy had dropped her cell phone and while she tried to pick it up she didn't recognize Mister Dallas walking up behind her. Tommy spoke into the phone, "Brandy, what's up?" All he heard was her struggling to get away from someone, and then she picked up the phone and started to run. "Brandy what's happening?"

She was almost out of breath from running from the man who was supposed to have killed several people. Brandy thought that Tommy was her only hope of survival and so shouted, "Tommy, go to the building, Mister Dallas is trying to kill me! We have captured a woman from an Amish community and he is trying to drain her DNA." Brandy slammed into the ground, and when she looked behind her Mister Dallas had his strange device pointed at her. "No please, don't hurt me!" Now, she screamed as she watched the blue light shoot out of the small machine that was as long as a can of air freshener Brandy screamed as loud as she could, and then fell to the ground.

Inside the control room of the TARDIS The Doctor and Tommy both heard the loud scream of the girl. Tommy yelled, "Brandy! Hey Brandy, are you still there?" He shouted as loud as he could and all he could here was the strange humming and shooting of the strange sounding device. "Doctor, what is that sound?"

The Doctor looked at the phone, "It's a Sonic lance, a machine only used by Time Lord assassins." Now The Doctor knew that whoever had activated the force field had to be a Time Lord, and The Doctor also knew how to find Tommy's girl. "Never fear my boy we shall be to the rescue in no time flat!" The Doctor flipped a large red lever up and the ship began moving toward the city. "Now to find that Time Lord." He began scanning for Time Lord technology and the computer showed a blueprint of a building, and it had wires running down into the center of the Earth, drawing raw energy from the molten core of the planet! "This doesn't make any sense." The Doctor muttered.

"What are you talking about?" Tommy asked as he looked at the computer screens of the strange control console.

"I ran a scan for technology from my people the Time Lords, and what I found out was that a building in the nearest town has all these conduits running down into the molten area of the planet's core, drawing lava out from the unstable area of your planet and into the city." The Doctor looked at the computer again, "That would explain the reason he has a Sonic lance, if he stole it all from a Time Lord."

Tommy said "Your saying that you're an alien?"

"Yap, now, you see my people would never let something like this happen, whoever is doing this has to have a damn good reason for drawing lava out onto the surface." The Doctor looked closer and saw that there was something at the center of the new fault line that had been created, a metal object.

"Doctor, when I was running from my destroyed house I saw a man walking toward me, he said he was The Darkman, and he said I would meet you and we would meet again." Tommy thought that now was the time to tell The Doctor about this. "Also, when I fell into the fault line, I saw something metal, like lights in the lava far bellow." Tommy saw The Doctor thinking about it, and he was afraid that he had caused this thing to go along far to long.

"The Darkman is a myth, my people were supposed to have fought a war with another alien race called The Titans, and there leader was called The Darkman. He was supposed to have been exiled on Earth and we were all given warnings and biological detectors to pick him up whenever he's nearby. No, that cant be it, if that was the case, maybe the reason he has a TARDIS was because he killed a Time Lord who was sent to kill him." The Doctor rushed over to the computers and brought up the alien space ship that had been flooded in a river of molten lava centuries ago. "If that really is a Titan mother ship than, I know what The Darkman is doing."

"What?" Tommy asked as he walked around the glowing control console and looking at the holographic image he was looking at. "Why do they have Alice?"

"I don't know!" The Doctor said, "From what I know about the Titans they were sealed deep in the molten rock of your planet by my people, and a force field was erected by the Time Lords to keep it there. Only the DNA of a Time Lord human hybrid can free it." The Doctor felt the TARDIS land, and he decided to go and pay The Darkman a visit.

In the reception hall of the building dozens of scientists were rushing out of the building and finding that the streets were flowing with lava. "Danger, heat levels rising, project Eden nearing completion." The computerized voice said over and over again.

In her medical room Alice Summerfield was crying as the pain became almost too much for her to bear. She looked at all the bags of strange blue liquid, and wandered what they were containing. "Help me for the love of God!" She screamed and when she looked out at the window all she could see was a red glow from he lava streaming over the city.

From his office The Darkman, Mister Dallas watched as the scientists in the building were running outside and burning in the river of lava. He was laughing as he watched the blue liquid pour out of Alice Summerfield and into his hands. "Now I will have the hybrid DNA I need to free my people from their prison set up by the Time Lords." When the mother ship was freed he would signal his people, and once again the Titans would reign supreme. Then the computers began to scream out a loud danger.

"Danger, Danger, The Doctor is approaching, Danger!"

Tommy was trying to think as quick as he ever had in his life, "Okay, The Darkman killed a Time Lord and is using his machine to break his mother ship out of the center of the Earth. Now, we know that The Darkman needs the genetic code of a human Time Lord hybrid, could that be why he needs Alice?" Tommy knew that when they walked out of the ship they would be in five kinds of trouble, but he wanted to know what they were getting into before they left the ship.

"Yes, and I don't know, hold on, I know that he killed one Time Lord, and stole his TARDIS. He must be using the power of that ship to rip a new fault line in the Earth and he must be using that same power source to create the temporal field around the Amish community." The Doctor looked at the screen, and saw that the lava was reaching maximum pulse, and when that happened the entire tri state area would explode into flames. The Titan mother ship would be released and a new war against the Time Lords would begin. He couldn't let any of that happen, so he scanned the building for Time Lord DNA. Then it found it! The dead Time Lord, and Alice Summerfield. She had everything that was Time Lord about her, which was very little, being sucked out of her genetic makeup meaning that she would be left half human. The Darkman was killing her, and using her DNA to free his people.

"Can you stop him Doctor?" Tommy asked with tears in his eyes, "Is my Alice going to die before I tell her I love her?" He had gathered everything before now, and was scared for her life.

"I think so, you see, he has already taken the DNA from her bloodstream, and so all I have to do is destroy that DNA, and Alice will be human again." The Doctor rushed out toward the doors of the TARDIS, and behind him was Tommy Wallace. He wandered what the result of this disaster would be, how may people had already died, and how many people he could save.

Alice Summerfield was alone in the room; she looked at the tubes that were filling with the strange looking liquid. She was weary, and ready to die. She could feel death approaching, and was ready to die. She was ready to go to heaven and be with God. Alice Summerfield had wanted to be with Tommy Wallace, and she had her dreams smashed like all those buildings that she could here smashing outside. She began to cry thought, "I'm never going to see my father again am I?" She wasn't saying it to anyone in particular, just to God, a kind of prayer because she knew that was all she could do. She could feel the end coming for her, "I never got to tell Tommy I loved him." She said, and then closed her tired eyes; she closed her eyes that were tired of having their heart broken. She wandered if she would be punished for having a secrete friendship with Tommy Wallace, and then decided that she didn't care. Alice Summerfield had loved Tommy Wallace, and if her father didn't like it, if God didn't like it, too bad. Then she heard the sound of the TARDIS materializing, and it was a wonderful musical whooshing sound, like wind far off. She smiled, and somehow knew that it was Tommy coming to her rescue. She started laughing, and said "You here that sound? That is the man I love coming to save me!"

The Darkman watched in anger as the TARDIS began to appear, "No! No! No! This wont all be undone by some meddlesome Time Lord!" The Darkman saw that the DNA was completely taken from the girl, and he wouldn't have all his work undone. "Computer try and channel the DNA through the conduits of the building and down into the lava pool."

"Order not valid." The Computer responded.

"What?" Demanded The Darkman, "Computer why is the order not valid?"

"Temporal ship is appearing in the same room as the DNA, unable to control machines inside the room due to temporal shift."

Alice watched with her heart signing songs of victory, she knew that Tommy would save her, and she would be back home in no time. "I'm out here Tommy!" She shouted thinking that Tommy would actually here her cries of help. Now the entire blue box had materialized and the blue light atop the thing was glowing slightly. Alice smiled, and relaxed, she didn't want to die now, she wanted to live happily ever after with Tommy and she wanted to get out of here! The side door to the box opened and out stepped a very strange looking man. His hair was large and plumed around his head. His eyes were wide and curious. He was a tall man, and he was very well fit. Then, from behind the first man, Tommy walked out of the blue box! "I knew it! Praise the Lord you come to save me!"

From the control room The Darkman was watching everything he had worked for fall into pieces. The last hope to revive his people was in the same room as the new Time Lord who was about to take the girl out of the trap. Everyone had evacuated the building and was now burning by the lava flow braking out of the newly formed fault line that stretched half way across the United States. He wandered what he could do to stop those meddlers, and then he saw the Time Lord go for the DNA.

"Don't worry Alice, this is my friend The Doctor, he can heal you." Tommy wrapped his arms and reveled in the opportunity to hold the girl he loved over all things. "Thank God your alright." Tommy repeated over and over. In fact she was all right, she had been strapped up with wires and those had been ripped out of her when The Doctor had used his Sonic Screwdriver to stop the machines. Tommy saw that she had small spots where the needles had been were now bloody and The Doctor was holding his Sonic Screwdriver over them. "You're going to be fine." Tommy said, and for one of the first times in his life he felt like he was needed. That was a feeling that he had never had before, and he was glad he was experiencing it was Alice.

Alice smiled, she was weak, and hurt, but she knew she wouldn't die. The man she loved was holding Alice Summerfield, and she knew that he would protect her. "I knew that God would never let me die without seeing you again."

"Alice, hold on, The Doctor is going to destroy this place, and then we can take you home and you can live happily ever after with your family." Tommy didn't see The Doctor looking at the computer screen.

"I'm sorry Alice, but you can't go home."

"What?" Both Tommy and Alice asked at once as they looked at The Doctor.

"The lava flow from the erupting fault line, it's reached the Summerfield community, they're all dying." The Doctor had tears falling from his eyes as he told the poor girl that her only home was falling apart. He began working on tapping into the other Time Lord vessel's control devices. The Doctor knew that it wouldn't be difficult to do, but he didn't know what he should do about The Darkman.

Alice Summerfield looked at Tommy Wallace, " What does he mean, my family are all dead?" Alice wanted Tommy to tell her that The Doctor was just kidding, but she knew that he wasn't. Outside she could here the sounds of death that were growing and she could see smoke rising from the floor of the building.

"We have to get out of this building Doctor." Said Tommy, and then he looked at the computers that were showing red liquid poring out onto the ground.

"Yes I know, you and Alice go and get inside the TARDIS, and stay there." The Doctor knew that before he left this time period he had to do something about the Titan ships and The Darkman, whoever he was. He began operating his Sonic Screwdriver and saw that the Time Lord ship was parked just above the center of the fault line that was spewing out lava onto the streets.

Tommy Wallace lead Alice Summerfield into the large interior of the TARDIS, and when Alice saw that it was bigger on the inside than the outside she clutched Tommy's arm. "Oh my, what kind of machine is this?" Alice looked at the wires that were hanging all over the place and the large computer console in the center.

"It's an alien ship, something called a TARDIS at least that is what The Doctor calls it." Tommy lead Alice over to the elevated center of the room that had a floating couch on it, or it looked like a cross between a park bench and couch. "Just relax, and everything will be okay Alice, I'm here now." Tommy sat next to Alice who was suffering from the culture shock, and couldn't really say anything.

The Doctor looked at the screen, he used his Sonic Screwdriver to access it, and the image of a man in a business suit appeared on the screen. "Hello there you meddlesome Time Lord!" He said, and then walked around to the other side of the room he was broadcasting this message from. "You must be the one who has high jacked my captured time ship."

"Yes I did, I am The Doctor, and I will not allow you to threaten the rest of the galaxy by freeing the Titan mother ship. If they are freed than the Mondanians will detect it, and the grate war will start all over again. You don't want that do you?" The Doctor was trying to operate the controls of the time ship with his Sonic Screwdriver. His plain was to operate the machine to implode in on itself, and thus the time ship would fall into the newly formed fault line and destroy everything it created. It was cause the fault line to implode because the fault line had opened due to the power source in the machine, and if the machine was destroyed than the fault line wouldn't expand anymore. The Doctor also knew that the explosion would destroy the Titan mother ship, and the explosion would cause the lava that had spilled out of the fault to cool once the power source had been sealed.

"You are condemning me to death Doctor, if you destroy that ship than when the fault line closes and the ship explodes most of this city will be sucked down with it." The Darkman looked at The Doctor on the screen, "I have read up on you Doctor, and I know that you are no killer. If you allowed the ship to implode on itself and suck in the fault line you would be killing hundreds of people, would you be willing to do that?" The Darkman could see the city behind him burning in lava flows and being destroyed by balls of cooled off lava that were shooting out of the fault line and smashing into the buildings. He knew that his whole plain was in ruins and that if he didn't do something about it The Doctor would destroy everything he had worked for. His people would stay in their prison planets and the Mondanians would live on the Earth once the humans devised space travel.

"Yes." The Doctor said as he made the final computations on the Sonic Screwdriver had been completed. The Doctor knew all too well that when he ordered the time ship to implode it would cause the fault line to seal all the lava flows would cool that had emerged from the line. He knew that dozens would be trapped and many would die, but that was the price he would be willing to pay for saving the world. "That wont stop me though, because I know what will happen if you release the Titan mother ship." The Doctor pushed the button on his Sonic Screwdriver and began running back to the TARDIS. Everything was rocking back and forth because now the time ship hovering over the building was being sucked into the fault line and the fault was trying to seal itself. Everything was shaking and The Doctor could see outside that the red hot lava was cooling itself and forming a hard solid shape over the city. The Doctor ran back toward the blue box that was sitting on the side of the room quickly becoming filled with rubble and smoke from the burning building. When The Doctor reached the door he thought about offering to save The Darkman, but he decided against it, and walked inside the TADIS. Everything began to rip apart as soon as The Doctor was safe inside his space ship. He looked over to the control center and saw Alice Summerfield and Tommy Wallace talking by the controls. "Alright then, lets shoot off out of here." The Doctor trotted over toward the two at a fast step and reached for the center controls, almost all in the same movement.

Alice Summerfield looked at The Doctor and said, "Doctor, I want to go home, and I want to see if any of my family survived." Alice could here the rumble outside of the doors of the strange place.

The Doctor shook his head, "I'm sorry Alice, I saw the lava flow burn every house in that community, but I'll take you there right away." The Doctor began targeting the computers to go to the Amish place. He looked at the computer and wandered how many people were dying right now, and then thought of what would have happened if the Titan mother ship had escaped. The Doctor held a blue lever down, and all of the people inside the amazing ship had to hold onto the control console as the place began to shudder and shake. Sparks began to fly from the other side of the room, and wires were snapping off from side to side of the ship.

"What's happening Doctor?" Alice yelled as she gripped both edges of the control console of the control room.

"The fault line is closing itself, and the temporal force field is being sucked in with the time machine. We'll be lucky if we can escape!" The Doctor knew that the gravity pulls on the TARDIS were grate and amazing in its power.

Lights were flashing green and blue, green gas was filling one side of the amazing room, and in the chaos Alice grasped Tommy's hand. She was praying and suddenly a huge explosion on one side of the TARDIS sent all three people flying over to the other end. The gravity well from the side of the ship that was open was causing havoc among the three and they were all hanging on to anything they could find.

The Darkman was watching the blue box rise out of the building that was being sucked into the fault line. He was panicking, he was trapped. He knew that The Doctor was about to escape, and he would be killed when the building collapsed, so he yelled in anger, "Doctor! You murdering monster!"

The control room of the TARDIS had returned to normal, the ship had escaped the gravity well and the hole that had been created was sealing itself. The Doctor began to operate the control panel again, and upon further investigation Tommy was helping Alice up. "You okay Alice?" Tommy asked as he looked at the woman.

The Doctor smiled, they were both looking right into each other's eyes, and it was the kind of look that gave away their secret true love. Tommy held her hand and she stood in thee control room. The Doctor had set the controls and the alien writing was flashing all across the screens on the walls of the ship. "So, where do you two want me to take you both?" The Doctor almost certainly knew that Alice would want to go home, but he also knew that she was in love with Tommy. If Alice was rational than she would have asked to be taken home, but love wasn't rational, and The Doctor knew he could never predict what it would make the girl say.

"Take me home, I want to see for myself if my family are all gone, maybe some survived." Somehow Alice knew that she clinging to a hope that was fading, that because she knew The Doctor she knew that he was telling her the truth, and she would find that her family was gone. Alice was afraid, but it was a paradox of fear within her that she really feared. You see if she went back home and her family was still living then she could be happy, and live her simple life on the farm and obey her father. If that was the case, than she could never have any sort of relationship with Tommy, and Alice wanted that above all things. She looked around this strange ship, and thought to herself, _'does The Doctor live here?'_ Alice wandered where she would go if her family were gone, would Tommy take care of her? She wandered about that, and then when she thought of it she laughed.

Tommy heard Alice laugh and asked, "What's so funny Alice, are you laughing at me?" He intended the last part of that to be a joke. Then when she looked serious and a pause filled the room Tommy began rather worried she was laughing at him.

"I was just wandering, if my parents were dead, and my house was gone, than what would we do?" Alice tried to conceal her laughter and was very serious.

Tommy saw The Doctor watching both of them, "Well, you see the college was paying for my house, I suppose they would probably get me another one. Then we could do what all other couples do, move in together."

"Move in together?" Repeated Alice, and then walked over and gave Tommy a hug, "One step at a time." She whispered in his ear.

The Doctor was powering down the TARDIS, it was landing in the heart of Summerfield, or what was left of it, and The Doctor feared what Alice would do when she walked outside. "Well, were here." He watched Tommy hold Alice's hand and the two walked out into the sunlight.

Alice Summerfield had tears in her eyes as soon as she looked at what was once her home for the first eighteen years of her life. Everything had been covered in a thick blackish coating that felt as hard as ground. Alice looked down and saw she was standing on a roof, a part of a roof was sticking up out of the hard covering. She burst into tears and sobbing came instantly. "Oh Tommy, The Doctor was right, their all dead!" She threw her head on his shoulders and wrapped her arms around his chest. She had her entire world destroyed, and now he was all she had left.

The Doctor shook his head in shame, he wished he could have stopped Alice from walking outside and looking at the devastation of her hometown, but he couldn't. He saw Tommy lead her back inside the control room, and he was telling her that everything would be okay and not to worry. The Doctor felt responsible, so he said, "So where to now kids?"

Tommy looked at Alice, "I don't know Doctor, can this thing take us to my home?"

"Yes it can, you know I am about to travel off into time and space, I could use the company. I mean it doesn't look like you two have anywhere to go, so why not travel with me?" The Doctor smiled from the circular control panel and waited to here what they each had to say.

"Can Alice come along?" Tommy asked, and looked at the girl standing next to him, "How about it Alice? Travel with The Doctor, and see the galaxy?" Tommy wanted her to say yes, he wanted any excuse just to spend time with Alice, and this would be the perfect opportunity to do so. The doors behind them closed and Tommy looked at Alice as she thought about the question.

Alice smiled at both men who were looking at her, "You know, now that you ask, I haven't ever seen anything outside my home. Well I've seen Edwardsville, but that really isn't much. You know what, I think I would like to travel a bit, spend some time with the man I love, yes Doctor, lets see the galaxy." It was the toughest decision that Alice Summerfield ever made in her life. She had chosen to leave the place where she had been born and travel with the man she loved, and another man she hardly knew called The Doctor. She looked around the place, and the floating couch was nearby so she sat down and watched The Doctor leap form one side of the control station to the other. "So where are we going Doctor?" She asked, and wandered what amazing thing he would say.

The Doctor smiled and said "Well I have to go back to my planet and tell them about the missing Time Lord, but that's where this old ship is going." The Doctor began operating the controls and the strange whooshing sound swept up again. The center of the control room had a large glass column in the middle of it, and a smaller green cylinder in the center of that. The green thing was moving up and down and as the whooshing sound became louder the green cylinder went up and down faster. Outside the blue box vanished and the TARDIS zipped off into the time vortex.

The End,

The adventures of The Eighth Doctor, Tommy Wallace, and Alice Summerfield continue in their next adventure, "The Tomorrow Children."


End file.
